As developed economies reel from disproportionate COVID-19 related death among the elderly and in congregate care settings, isn’t it time to rip up the old models, which weren’t working anyhow, and start afresh with creative ideas and 21st-century innovation?

From an ethical point of view, the vulnerable elderly and disabled in our midst deserve better. The post-World War II Baby-Boom cohort is entering their 70s and will soon overwhelm the existing age care & support systems.

From an economics point of view, we need to do something to bend the cost curve. Don’t we all deserve long-term care that’s better than what we have now?

This program will take a brief look at how we got here and chart a new course for service delivery models in the long-term care sector. Starting over in long-term care will include preferences of consumers who are now in their 70s and younger, technologies including “ambient assisted living” as well as innovative oversight methods which minimize gaming and human error.

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

Healthcare systems in many places around the world are rising to meet the challenges of the pandemic and are not focused on elective or non-urgent procedures. In this unprecedented crisis, how should health tourism providers and destination management organizations communicate with their audiences?

Marketing communications messages need to be different in the context of a global pandemic and healthcare crisis. This webinar will focus on how health tourism providers and destination managers can best handle both external & internal communications in a crisis.

Covid-19 has changed the way the health tourism markets will do business.

Click here to view the presentation slides.

• As travel markets start to thaw from a deep freeze; what about health tourism?
• Consumers are uncertain about travel and travelling into and out of many destinations remains difficult.
• However, consumers have started traveling; what can we do to encourage them to consider health, dental and medical
• services? Demand is pent up, and as the travel markets begin to thaw, what can we expect?
• Among healthcare systems, now that the immediate challenges of the pandemic have passed, how difficult will it be to resume elective and ambulatory procedures? For resorts, spas and other operators focused on the wellness markets, will they be able to resume “normal” business?
• How can health tourism providers and destination management organizations plan for the future?

Click here to view the presentation slides. 

If you are a decision-maker for a hospital, wellness spa, dental clinic, cosmetic surgery clinic, or tourism board, this Timely Issues podcast offers an unbiased look at the likely path to recovery from experienced experts in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.

Can we anticipate the likely return of health tourism markets around the globe? Yes. Understanding that “health tourism” is not a single, monolithic business or industry, but a set of regional vertical markets; the end of COVID-19 shows the fragmentation in health tourism markets.

We are seeing hopeful signs of the end to the dreadful COVID-19 pandemic. The vaccines work against the initial strain and (mostly) the variants, new ones are coming online and, overall, they all have modest side effects. The goal of herd immunity is in sight; for the UK it could be as early as May 2021, in the US June 2021 and in the Euro Zone, because of delays in vaccine access, herd immunity may not be achieved until May 2022.

Because of the complexity of the virus (SARS-CoV-2), its many variants and the uncoordinated public health response between and among countries, it is likely that we will see positivity go up and down for the next 12 to 18 months.

This podcast looks at:

• Preparing for recovery – what providers and destinations need to do now to improve consumer confidence
• Changes to regional corridors – can travel bubbles in Southeast Asia, Australia & New Zealand and Europe accelerate demand
• New market segments – coronavirus concerns are changing the way consumers think and feel

If you are a decision-maker for a hospital, wellness spa, dental clinic, cosmetic surgery clinic, or tourism board, this program offers an unbiased look at the most-likely path to recovery presented by experienced experts in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.

As wave after wave of the pandemic surges through the US, Canada and the UK, an outsized proportion of deaths (42% or more) have occurred in long-term care facilities. The institutions designed for protection, care and treatment of the elderly and vulnerable in our communities have revealed their shortcomings. Isn’t this a good time to seriously reconsider their design?

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

Even before COVID-19, the sector endured widespread economic and operational problems. Now, nursing homes and assisted living residences are reeling from the loss of patients, lower revenues, staff recruitment and retention obstacles as well as a growing call for review and reform from the public and government agencies. We haven’t yet seen the tide of litigation, which is bound to swell as guilt-ridden and angry families seek to take revenge for the deaths of tens of thousands of their relatives.

How can the sector survive – or more accurately, how will it survive?

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

LTC webinar: Retaining & Recruiting Staff in Long Term Care, 2nd June 2022.

In this webinar, we will delve briefly into “how we got here”. Most importantly, we will offer concrete steps which can be taken by operators, managers, and regulators to alleviate this pernicious long term care staffing crisis.

Rather than pointing fingers, this program focuses on intelligent, effective responses, including sourcing, recruitment, and retention. We will focus on:

• Methods to engage with, and listen to front line workers
• Retention features that are often more important than pay
• The single most effective recruitment method
• What you need to know from an exit interview
• The three (3) specific steps government regulators can take to mitigate this crisis

Listen to this open discussion with more examples and insight.

The panelists:

* Patricia Montealegre, International Patient Services at Sant Joan de Deu Children’s Hospital Barcelona Spain

*Dr. Sinan Aran, Director International Program and Florence Nightingale Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey *Christian Fadi El-Khouri, MESC International Patient Service, Hamburg Germany

* Talip Kurumehmet, International Patient Services Department, Medipol Health Group, Turkey

Facilitated by Elizabeth Ziemba of Medical Tourism Training and Irving Stackpole, Stackpole & Associates.

Ukrainian and Russian medical travelers have been caught up in the crisis, and in the geo-political responses. Patients and families who had travelled for necessary medical care now find themselves between their destinations and their homes. And those who had planned travel for health reasons now find themselves in limbo. Flows of patients from these two countries will be disrupted for some time to come, disrupting services offered by international patient departments around the world.

This panel discussion covered the issues for medical travelers and their families, and offered insights and suggestions based on personal practical experience.

While the pandemic news has been quiet recently, we must not forget the death and devastation that Covid 19 brought upon congregate care. Understanding how this happened, without hand-wringing or other unproductive reactions, is the beginning of the solution.

To fix a problem it’s necessary first to understand it.

In this podcast, we cover a history of the key failures and how we might reimagine them::

• Aging & Residential Options; how did we get here?
• Cookie Cutter Solutions; how to redesign physical centers
• Why Size Matters: The design & economics of new, “small house” models

Long-term, congregate care facilities – especially nursing homes – are at the bottom of the social & healthcare food chain. We’ll talk about how we can battle these social stigmas and redesign facilities & programs for a better long-term future.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

The health tourism markets (wellness, health, medical and dental) were reduced to ashes by the pandemic. Like the mythical Phoenix, the markets are rising from the pandemic ashes. This re-emergence is not happening smoothly – far from it! People have been changed by the experience of the pandemic in ways that we still don’t completely understand.

The picture which is emerging is more complex – and success requires discipline, as well as more careful management and planning. The potential rewards, however, could be greater and more sustainable than the chaotic opportunism of the recent past.

What Are The Lessons We’ve Learned?

• The lesson is to build even greater levels of flexibility into your business model. This includes looking outside of the usual travel and tourism market and thinking how to remain top of mind with your customers.
• Two factors – demand & fear – are going back-and-forth like a seesaw. Destinations and providers which understand this conflict in motivation will respond effectively through marketing messages, images and consulting sales approaches.

If you are a decision-maker for a hospital, wellness spa, dental clinic, cosmetic surgery clinic, or tourism board, this program offers an unbiased look at the most-likely path to recovery presented by experienced experts in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.

Congregate long-term care in the US, UK and Canada (nursing homes, assisted living, memory care, care homes, independent living, life plan communities, CCRC’s and others) were overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic. And a new virus variant is now spreading quickly within these operations.

While some providers fared better than others, a disproportionate share of COVID-19 related infections and deaths occurred in these facilities. What have we learned from this tragic loss of life?

This podcast looks at:

• demographics of demand & overcoming political somnolence
• obstacles and opportunities to adapt & change the physical, built environments of long-term care
• sourcing, recruiting & retaining care staff post-Covid-19
• communications models to recruit support versus generate resilience

View slides and transcript here

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

Nursing homes, which are for the poor and disabled, and; 2. Market-rate assisted living residences, which are for the middle and upper class who are (almost) equally frail and disabled. But viruses don’t care if you’re well-to-do or poor; illness and death have beset both the poor and the well-off.

Front door admissions to nursing homes and assisted living residences have come to a screeching halt as the result of the pandemic, while back door discharges for hospitalizations and death have continued. When some sort of stabilization has finally taken hold, how can this sector recover? Headlines report fear and uncertainty, while images appear almost everywhere showing distraught family members on the outside looking through windows at confused residents on the inside. How will this situation affect the public’s willingness to accept congregate long-term care in the future? And importantly, will there be state or federal action to address this wholesale tragedy of neglect of the poor and vulnerable?

Click here to view the presentation slides. 

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

Before COVID-19, the sector endured widespread economic and operational problems. Now, nursing homes and assisted living residences, have lost occupancy & utilization, have lower revenues and face immense staff retention and recruitment obstacles.

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

Urgent questions about the future of congregate long-term care must be addressed in a sober, eyes-wide-open discussion. At this juncture, if we are rigorous about not carrying biases, profit motives or legacy models of control and management into these discussions, we have an opportunity to create a far more rational model. This must start with a sober assessment of the current situation.

This moment in time is painful for the long-term care sector but is also a distinct opportunity to rethink and reconfigure congregate long-term care.

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

This webinar will focus on how to congregate care center managers can best handle both external & internal communications in a crisis.

Before the COVID-19 epidemic, crisis communications skills had been “What if”, today the pressing question is, “What do I do now?” This podcast answers that question!

Click here to view the presentation slides

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

The COVID-19 crisis has plunged the global travel and tourism sector into a deep freeze, and the health tourism markets into hibernation.

With travel into and out of most destinations difficult or impossible, consumers have stopped traveling for health, dental and medical services. Demand is frozen.

On the supply side, healthcare systems are rising to meet the challenges of the pandemic. They are not focused on elective or non-urgent procedures. Supply is not available.

• In this unprecedented crisis, how can health tourism providers and destination management organizations look ahead and plan for the future?
• Will medical tourism “return to normal”?
• While the crisis is still unfolding, we can prepare for the lifting of travel restrictions, and a return to business activity in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.
• Will travellers return? And if they do, what will the “new normal” look like?
• Will health & wellness providers are able to adapt to consumers’ and patients’ concerns after months of restrictions?
• Which segments of these markets will return first?

Click here to view the presentation slides

If you are a decision-maker for a hospital, wellness spa, dental clinic, cosmetic surgery clinic, or tourism board, this Timely Issues podcast offers an unbiased look at the likely path to recovery from experienced experts in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.

Now that the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has ravaged congregate care centers in the UK and the US, will consumers and their adult advisors once again select these options?

What can operators, providers and marketing professionals do to encourage qualified consumers to once again consider congregate long-term care as a lifestyle choice, a voluntary relocation?

Relying upon peer-reviewed research and behavioural economics, this program will look at choice factors such as risk/benefit dynamics, perceived risk and the concept of “fear” in the selection of congregate long-term care solutions. Communications options such as “priming” and “framing” will be reviewed, as well as the current state of branding in congregate long-term care. Examples and case studies from both the United Kingdom and the United States will be used. Finally, we will review four (4) strategies used successfully in other declining markets to secure and restore acceptance and market share, exploring how these can be applied in congregate long-term care.

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Whether you are a decision-maker for a nursing home, assisted living or other senior care organization, listen to this Timely Issues podcast to hear about the possible paths to recovery for the congregate long-term care sector.

As the travel markets begin to thaw from their COVID-19 deep freeze, how might this affect the wellness, dental & health tourism markets?

Travel into and out of many destinations remains difficult, yet in some locations, consumers have started traveling; will they consider health, dental and medical services? Demand is pent up, and as the travel markets begin to thaw, what can we expect?

In this unprecedented time, we will look at how health tourism providers and destination management organizations should plan for the future.

• Will medical tourism “return to normal”?
• While the crisis is still unfolding, how can we prepare for the resumption of travel, and a return to business activity in the health, wellness, dental & medical tourism markets?
• Will travellers return? And if they do, what will the “new normal” look like?
• Will health & wellness providers be able to adapt to consumers’ and patients’ concerns after months of restrictions?
• Which segments of these markets will return first?

Click here to view the presentation slides

If you are a decision-maker for a hospital, wellness spa, dental clinic, cosmetic surgery clinic, or tourism board, this Timely Issues podcast offers an unbiased look at the likely path to recovery from experienced experts in the health, wellness and medical tourism markets.